OK, I proudly admit it! I am a Constitutional conservative. However, I don’t listen to Rush Limbaugh; I don’t listen to Neal Boortz; I don’t watch Sean Hannity or Bill O’Reilly; and I listen to NPR and watch CNN and GPB as much as I watch Fox News. I actually watched Anderson Cooper until his giggles got the best of me. I am not a conservative because of the ranting and raving which is occasionally heard from conservative broadcast sources. No worse diatribe however, than that coming from Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann on the other side, whom I do not watch either. In addition, I don’t hate gays, I don’t hate blacks, I don’t hate women, (I really love them to the extent my precious wife will allow me) I don’t hate minorities, I don’t hate illegal immigrants. I do have a problem with any citizen or non-citizen who breaks our laws, including immigration laws. I have a serious problem with slackers who want someone else to provide for them. I believe in charity to help those in real need, which happens; and I see it as the responsibility of religious institutions, not public governments. I am a Constitutional conservative because I have so much respect for those men who pledged their very lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to birth the United States of America. They then, with the blessing of God’s providence, provided us with a Constitution to protect us from ourselves, most especially the rights of the individual against the tyranny of the majority. I remember that it was they who first gave us those words, “All men are created equal, They are endowed by their Creator (My Sovereign God) with certain unalienable Rights; that among them are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness,” but not Happiness itself. I regret they did not originally grant true liberty to all, but that has now been corrected constitutionally. I believe we are to use our God-given talents honestly to provide for ourselves and our loved ones, and then to give back to our community. I must respond, therefore, to last week’s column asserting that all conservatives expected a resounding Romney victory, because conservative media told them to do so. I suspected he would lose, and if he did win, it would be a squeaker. The reason is that I paid especial attention to those few swing states which really controlled the election. Both candidates knew where they were and spent the majority of their time and money there, even though many who did not live there took little notice. Obama, knowing he could not run on any accomplishments he had made, decided to thoroughly vilify Romney in those swing states with everything he could muster. Romney, in his own wisdom, decided to try to stay above the fray, and did not respond. His strategy failed. Those few states gave Obama a narrow victory. As a recovering politician myself, I congratulate Obama on running a successful campaign---he won. To him, the end justified any means. But I personally disagree and regret that our country has fallen so far in politics. And I do not see any real room for gloating by his side. President Obama was the first President to be re-elected with less popular votes than his previous election since FDR in 1944, nearly 70 years ago. But even then FDR only lost 6% of his former support. President Obama lost a full 10% of his previous voters on November 6.The latest figures I have show Obama’s 2008 vote total was 69,498,516. His 2012 vote was only 62,611,250. And he certainly did all he could to get out his popular vote. Furthermore, his re-election electoral votes, 332 (the votes which really elect) were the absolute lowest since Georgia’s own Jimmy Carter in 1980, widely considered the biggest re-election loser of the 20th century. By contrast Richard Nixon won re-election with 520 electoral votes and Ronald Reagan won re-election with 525 electoral votes. Those are what most professionals call mandates. They happen when a nation feels their President has accomplished something. 332 electoral votes does not indicate that. In a country which I controlled as benevolent dictator, there would be no ads even referring to an opponent; there would be a maximum amount of spending allowed to run for President or any other office; there would be a limit on how much a wealthy candidate could contribute to his or her own campaign; there would be no freedom of speech guaranteed to corporations; (only individuals) there would be statutory term limits for all offices; a President could serve only one 6 year term; and it would be a Federal crime to accept any remuneration whatsoever for lobbying efforts. Lobby as much as you want, as long as you don’t get paid. Within a generation, we might have a chance of saving this great republic.